More than 32,000 student nurses could drop out of their courses in the next few years because of financial pressures, struggling services and worsening pay prospects, a leading health union is warning.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said its study showed that without action to make the career more attractive, the Government’s plans to reform the NHS would be undermined.
Student nurses in England have been dropping out since the nursing bursary was scrapped in 2016, but tens of thousands could leave before graduating by 2029, said the RCN.
Addressing the debt burden and easing cost-of-living pressures is the best way to reduce the dropout rate, alongside increasing nursing pay to make the career more attractive, the RCN said, adding that in the health service in England, there are 31,774 nursing posts currently vacant.
RCN General Secretary Professor Nicola Ranger, said: “The students of today are the nurses of the future, but for tens of thousands, the unbearable weight of graduate debt, lack of support with living costs and prospect of low pay is set to push them out of the profession before they qualify. This is a tragedy for them and patients.
“To deliver the Government’s NHS reforms we need to supercharge recruitment into nursing, but we can’t do that with a broken education model or more real terms pay cuts.
“Ministers should change course and agree a social contract with nursing students that sees pay rise and loans forgiven if they commit to working in public services.
“Transforming care cannot happen without investment to transform nursing. That means changing the way we recruit into the profession and making it a more attractive career by raising pay.”
The RCN has criticised a planned 2.8% pay rise for NHS nurses in England, describing it as an “insult to workers, harmful for patients and counterproductive to rebuilding the NHS.”
A Government spokesperson said: “These figures are speculative. As we deliver our plan for change, we are taking action to fix our broken NHS and ensure nursing remains an attractive career choice.
“We have already delivered pay rises for over 1.4 million agenda for change staff, including nurses, and together with the NHS we will unveil a refreshed workforce plan in the summer to provide the health service with much-needed stability and certainty.
“We are also creating a sustainable higher education funding system that supports students, including by increasing the maximum loan for living costs in line with inflation next year.”
